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Chase Freedom Student Review

2023.6 Update: New card. No credit history required.

Contents

Application Link
Benefits
Disadvantages
Introduction to UR Points
Recommended Application Time
Summary
Related Credit Cards
After Applying
Historical Offers Chart
Application Link

Application Link

Chase Freedom Rise

Benefits

$25 offer: earn a $25 statement credit after signing up for automatic payments within the first 3 months.
Earn 1.5% cash back on everything.
Although this card is advertised as a cash back card, it actually earns Ultimate Rewards (UR) points. We estimate that Ultimate Rewards (UR) points are worth about 1.6 cents/point, see below for a brief introduction. So the 1.5x UR earning rate is worth about 2.4%!
No annual fee.

Disadvantages

It has foreign transaction fee, so it's not a good choice outside the US.

Introduction to UR Points

You can earn UR points with Chase Freedom Student, Chase Freedom, Chase Freedom Unlimited (CFU), Chase Sapphire Preferred (CSP), Chase Sapphire Reserve (CSR), Chase Ink Cash (Business), Chase Ink Unlimited (Business), Chase Ink Preferred (Business), etc.
You can move your UR points from one UR card to another at any time.
UR points never expire. You will lose the UR points on one card if you close the account, but you can prevent losing your UR points by moving the points to another UR card beforehand.
If you have Chase Sapphire Preferred (CSP), Chase Sapphire Reserve (CSR), or Chase Ink Preferred (Business), UR points can be transferred to some hotel points. One of the best way to use UR points is to 1:1 transfer to Hyatt points. UR points can also be transferred to some airline miles. One of the most common and best way to use UR points is to 1:1 transfer them to United Airlines (UA) miles (Star Alliance), and combine them with the UA miles earned from the UA card. Other good options are: Southwest (WN) (Non-alliance), British Airways (BA) (Oneworld), Virgin Atlantic (VS) (Non-alliance), etc. If you use UR points in this way, the value is about 1.6 cents/point.
If you have Chase Sapphire Reserve (CSR), you can redeem your UR points at a fixed rate 1.5 cents/point towards air tickets or hotels on UR travel portal; if you have Chase Sapphire Preferred (CSP) or Chase Ink Preferred (Business), you can redeem your UR at a fixed rate 1.25 cents/point towards air tickets or hotels on UR travel portal.
If you have any of the UR cards, you can redeem your UR points at a fixed rate 1 cent/point towards cash.
In summary, we estimate that UR points are worth about 1.6 cents/point.
For more information about UR points, see Maximize the Credit Card Points Values (overview), and Introduction to UR: How to Earn and Introduction to UR: How to Use (very detailed).

Recommended Application Time

You can get approved even with no credit history at all! (SSN required)
Having a Chase checking account with a balance of at least $250 will increase your chances of getting approved for Chase Freedom Rise.
[5/24 Rule] If you have 5 or more new accounts opened in the past 24 months, Chase will not approve your application on this card, no matter how high your credit score is. The number of new accounts includes all credit card accounts, not only Chase accounts. See this post for details about how to possibly bypass this rule.

Summary

This is a card designed for people with no credit history by Chase. Although sign up bonus is not great, this card has a decent earning rate as your first credit card. I guess after one year you can also convert it to better cards such as Chase Freedom Flex (CFF) or Chase Freedom Unlimited (CFU).

Related Credit Cards

After Applying

Call 800-436-7927 to check Chase application status. This is an automated telephone line, and the information has the following meanings: Receive decision in 2 weeks means your application is probably approved; Receive decision in 7-10 days means your application is probably rejected; Receive decision in 30 days simply means your application requires further review and there’s nothing to tell you for now.
Chase reconsideration backdoor number: 888-270-2127 or 888-609-7805. Call it if you didn’t get approve immediately. Your personal information will be acquired and they will then review it. You seldom answer questions, instead, just enjoy the music and then you get approved or rejected, or further information is needed to be hand in to the branch or faxed.